Create a Custom Refresh Image in Windows 8 with Recimg (Historical)

Historical support note: This procedure is specific to Windows 8. The recimg.exe custom Refresh-image workflow should not be treated as a Windows 10 or Windows 11 recovery method.

Windows 8 introduced Refresh your PC, and recimg.exe allowed advanced users to create a custom image that Windows could use during Refresh.

A custom Refresh image could include installed desktop applications and the system state represented by the image. It was not a complete personal-file backup and should never have been the only copy of important data.

Create and register the image

1. Create a folder for the image, for example:

C:\RefreshImage

2. Press Windows + X and open Command Prompt (Admin).
3. Run:

recimg.exe /createimage C:\RefreshImage

4. Leave the PC powered and allow the process to finish.

Windows creates a CustomRefresh.wim file and registers the new image for the Refresh feature.

Keep the image current

If applications changed significantly after the image was created, a newer image could be created so a future Refresh did not restore an unnecessarily old application state.

Important limitations

• This image is tied to the Windows 8 Refresh mechanism.
• It is not a sector-by-sector disk image.
• It does not replace a backup of documents, photos, and other personal files.
• Do not copy this procedure into Windows 10/11 recovery articles; those releases use different reset/recovery mechanisms.

Official/historical references

• Microsoft Q&A describing recimg.exe /createimage on Windows 8: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/answers/questions/2692373/creating-a-custom-image
• Microsoft Windows lifecycle status: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/deployment/updates-lifecycle/what-does-it-mean-if-windows-isn-t-supported